Shaping Subject Position Of Future Teachers In Dialogic Communication

Abstract

The article justifies the necessity of forming a subject position of future teachers while studying at university. This position characterizes the teacher's attitude towards meaning, goals, process and results of pedagogical activities. The authors determine and characterize the main factor of subject position formation. This factor is dialogical communication which helps orient future teachers towards accepting the individuality of the partners. The means of forming the subject position of future teachers are described – educational situations that are intentionally created. These situations model professional and pedagogical activity and require certain regulatory actions from future teachers and include setting the goals, modeling the conditions, programming the actions, evaluating the results of pedagogical activity. A set of teaching methods based on interactive communication is presented, which contributes to the formation of a subject position: discussions, brainstorming, case-methods, and project methods. The authors argue that it is possible to consider the style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity that characterizes typical ways of class management to be a criterion for the subject position of future teachers. The results of the experimental study show the transition of future teachers’ professional training from an ineffective style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity that characterize average and low values of regulatory actions, to an effective style of self-regulation that is distinguished by higher values of regulatory actions. The conclusion is made about the effectiveness of the impact of dialogic communication on formation of subject position of future teachers.

Keywords: Dialogic methods of teachingregulatory actions

Introduction

Students who major in professional training pedagogy assimilate values of the teacher profession, acquire special psychological and pedagogical knowledge and skills, and develop professionally important personal qualities. The implementation of the humanistic paradigm by a modern system of professional and pedagogical education determines the need of training the subjective position in future teachers of professional training. In contrast to the objective position, the subjective position is an "individual's active, selective, initiative, responsible, transformative attitude of an individual to himself or herself, to reality, to the world and life in general"; (Chozgiyan, 2014). The teacher's subjective position characterizes the attitude to pedagogical activity: its goals, meaning, process and results. At the same time, according to the results of the research, about 50% of neophyte teachers have a low level of the development of the subjective position, and about 40% have a moderate level (Chozgiyan, 2014). This requires that researchers develop a new approach to the process of education of future teachers of professional training in the university that would involve activation of some factors, i.e. resources of formation of a subjective position.

Problem Statement

Thus, in the theory and methodology of professional pedagogical education there is obviously a problem related to the determination of the factors of formation of a subjective position in future teachers of professional training. The formation of the subjective position in future teachers of professional training during their university studies was chosen as the subject of research.

Research Questions

The question of the research was to what extent dialogic communication forms the subjective position of future teachers of professional training during their university studies.

Purpose of the Study

The study aimed to theoretically substantiate and experimentally test the effectiveness of the impact of dialogical communication on the formation of a subjective position of future teachers of professional training.

We assumed that the usage of dialogic communication in the educational situations intentionally created by a professor would contribute to the formation of the subjective position of future teachers of professional training, the criterion of which will be the style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity.

The questions of the study were defined according to its purpose:

• to make a review of literature devoted to the problem of forming a subjective position of future teachers of professional training;

• to determine the types of educational situations and the spectrum of teaching methods which are based on dialogic communication and contribute to the formation of the subjective position of future teachers;

• to test the effectiveness of the impact of dialogic communication on the formation of the subjective position of future teachers during their university studies.

Research Methods

A set of methods that was used in the research consisted of theoretical methods (analysis, synthesis, comparison, generalization, classification); empirical methods (pedagogical experiment, psychological testing); method of mathematical statistics (calculation of the Wilcoxon T-test).

Findings

According to the first goal of the research, a theoretical analysis of pedagogical literature was conducted. The analysis revealed that the concept of " a teacher's subjective position" is not used in the countries other than Russia and former Soviet Union countries. However, in Russia and former Soviet Union countries the problem of the teacher's subjective position has been studied quite deeply. Unfortunately, no scientific research of the subjective position of professional training teachers' was found. Also, a number of works devoted to the subjective position of future and beginner teachers have been made. These works can be used as a theoretical basis for the study of the formation of the subjective position of future teachers of professional training.

O.P. Litovka revealed the role of the subjective position of a future teacher: it determines both the integral process of professional growth of the teacher and personal development of his students (Shekhavtsova, 2017). According to M.V. Agulov, the process of shaping the qualities of a future teacher's personality that would ensure his growth as an agent of educational process is the goal of modern pedagogical education and an important research problem (Knyazeva, 2012).

O.V. Shcherbakova roughly differentiated three components in the structure of the future teachers' subjective position: "the motivational and behavioral component (professional motives, professional values, and professional relations); cognitive and informational component (knowledge of professional educational program subjects); pragmatist and regulative component (professional skills, professional self-regulation, and professional reflection)" (Doncheva, 2014).

According to O.P. Chozgian, "the teacher's subjectivity includes an emotional response both to what is being transformed and to the transformations themselves" (Khadzhieva 2014).

The study of M.V. Hadjieva revealed that "the peculiarities of development of the teacher's subjective position depend on the influence of objective (external, environmental) factors which form the style of his professional activity through subjective (internal, personal) characteristics of the teacher," (Galanova, 2013).

S.O. Shegavtsova argues that to form the subjectivity of future teachers it is necessary to realize the following ideas: modeling of future pedagogical activity; interpersonal interaction; organization of reflection; gaining individualized experience (Treshhev, 2001).

A.M. Treschev emphasized that one of the main conditions that determine the formation of the professional subjective position of a future teacher is the "dialogueness" of educational situation, since only in a dialogue it is possible to find ways to harmonize the goals, values and personal meaning of a pedagogical activity (Chozgiyan, 2014).

O.O.Linnik is of the same opinion: "Forming responsibility and initiative of the future teacher is conditioned by situations in which the future teacher would need to achieve the best result according to specific requirements" (Santkhi, Edvard & Selyam, 2017).

Thus, researchers agree that the subjective position of future teachers is the result of his or her personal and professional development. Today a degree in Pedagogy fosters development of the subjective position of future teachers. The analysis of scientific literature made it possible to assume that dialogical communication can serve as an objective-subjective factor in the formation of the subjective position in the future teachers of professional training. Its specific features are sincerity and trust, judgement-free perception of partners in communication, and empathy.

In the foreign pedagogical literature, the concept of "interactive teaching methods" is used as the equivalent of the concept of "dialogic teaching methods". The studies of A.S. Kuseynaliyeva (Khusejnalieva, 2004), (Nikolaeva, 2015), and V. Santkhi's (Santkhi, 2017) allowed to conclude that interactive teaching methods are used for teacher training and especially for training of foreign language teachers and teachers of Russian as a foreign language. G.R. Abirova expressed the point of view that "the use of interactive teaching methods allows to create comfortable conditions under which the student feels successful, intellectual force that makes the learning process productive and enables him to fully reveal his or her personality" (Khusejnalieva, 2014).

According to L. Doncheva, the teaching methods that ensure effective interaction between the teacher and students include discussion, games, case studies, brainstorming, and projects (Litovka, 2012).

A significant number of studies by Russian researchers are devoted to the problem of dialogical communication. They reveal a true versatility of this phenomenon. O. A. Galanova points out that "the idea of dialogue-based lesson is inseparably connected to the psychological idea of subjectivity" (Fedorova, 2015).

Dialogue assumes equality of partners in communication. According to L.V. Nikolaeva and R.V. Savvinova, the development of the subjective position of students is promoted by such attitudes of university teachers that foster a democratic style of communication: the teacher as moderator (the organizer of interactive communication), the teacher as tutor (consultant), and the teacher as coach [3].

O. N. Knyazeva found that various types of dialogue in professional training of future teachers provide "a representation of professional activity in the form of consistent solutions of actual pedagogical problems and tasks" (Bodnar & Zhurat, 2013).

The analysis of literature made it possible to define a set of teaching methods based on dialogical communication and their potential to influence the subjective position in future teachers. They include discussion, brainstorming, case study method, and project-based learning.

According to A.Ya.Bodnar and Yu.V.Zhurat, the formation of subjectivity of a teacher as an agent of pedagogical activity should meet the requirements to teacher's professionalism (Linnik , 2017).

E. N. Fedorova and L. M Fedoryak developed 4 types of training situations which provide inclusion of a student in joint activity with the university teacher: 1) the axiological situation that fosters a student's understanding of the value of another person and the development of empathy; 2) the situation of creative self-realization designed to figure out the interlocutor's point of view and to find a compromise; 3) the situation of acquiring new experience connected with finding new meanings in a new system of relationships with other person; 4) the situation of reflection and evaluation which helps to reconsider irrelevant views and to find a new meaning of activity (Fedorova & Fedoryak, 2015).

Based on the ideas of E.N. Fedorova, L. M. Fedoryak we suggest that the identified types of educational situations can enhance formation of the subjective position of a teacher.

In accordance with the third goal of the study, an experiment was made to examine how effective dialogical communication can be in the formation of a future teacher's subjective position. This experiment work was carried out at the Department of Engineering Pedagogy of the Siberian State Automobile and Highway University from September 2017 to January 2018. The pedagogical experiment involved 2 teachers and 30 students who were equally divided into experimental and control groups.

The participants were offered to model four types of educational situations (axiological communication, creative self-realization, acquisition of a new experience, reflection and evaluation) during classes of general professional disciplines. The inclusion of future teachers in joint activities with instructors and fellow students was one of the conditions of the experiment. These educational situations modeled professional and pedagogical activity, i.e., the analysis and solution of problems by using the method of discussion, brainstorming, case study method, and project method. Dialogic communication stimulated the need of future teachers to be subjects of activity and helped not only to learn certain educational material, but also to realize its personal significance and to comprehend their experiences associated with difficulties in solving problems, i.e., to gain experience in overcoming obstacles to achieve their professional and pedagogical goals.

The criterion of formation of the subjective position of future teachers is the style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity that characterizes typical ways of teacher behavior. In accordance with this, the regulatory actions of goal-setting, modeling of conditions, programming of actions, and evaluation of the results of professional and pedagogical activity indicated the formation of subjective position of future teachers of professional training.

The results of diagnostics according to the methodology of V.I. Morosanova "Style of self-regulation of behavior" showed that after conducting the pedagogical experiment, 53% of participants in the experimental group had an effective style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity (which is characterized by high rates of the development of regulatory actions). At the same time, in the control group, only 24% of participants had an effective style of self-regulation of professional and pedagogical activity.

The reliability of differences in the values of regulatory actions before and after the experimental work was verified by the Wilcoxon T-test .Differences in the experimental group are statistically significant at p≤0.05, since the empirical T (28) is less than the tabular T(30). Differences in the control group were not statistically significant: the empirical T (32) is bigger than the tabular T (30).

Conclusion

Thus, the hypothesis of the research was confirmed: the use of teaching methods based on dialogic communication in the educational situations that were intentionally created by the teacher and that modeled pedagogical activities and required regulatory actions to achieve the goal helps to form the subjective position in future teachers.

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